Monday, 11 June 2012

Shanghai-ed

I had a lot of
expectations from Shanghai. Mostly because, in its initial days of
production, I thought it was a political thriller involving the Chinese secret
service and a plot to nuke India. But apparently, Agent Vinod and Ek
Tha Tiger are dealing with the spooks angle. Shanghai, on the other
hand, is better than I expected it to be. And its subject matter is much closer
to home than the ISI or the Chinese secret service.

Many critics have
called the movie a metaphor. For me, the movie was a metaphor and beyond. Set
in an Indian periurban village/town, presumably in north or central
India, Shanghai tells the story of an aspiration that the
Indian state envisages for its cities; an aspiration which pits decades of
faulty governance, lack of infrastructure and a volatile Indian public psyche
against the clean, geometric facade of civilization, and corporate
governance.

I won't go much into
the plot right now, mostly because I wish to keep this review spoiler free, and
partly because I intend to go beyond that.

In many ways, Shanghai is
about contrasts; more so, contradictions. Bharatnagar - the ground zero of the
genesis, so to say is where Dr. Ali Ahmadi (a kurta-jhola-beard sporting
Leftist) protests against the capitalist state turning the area into a SEZ. His
detractors want him out. Not because of the ideological differences; because in
India, politics is not about ideology anymore. It's a numbers game, as we see
the ruling coalition trying to keep its aspirations alive for this Shanghai -
to the extent of murdering the doctor.

The principal
characters Krishnan (Abhay Deol in his finest performance so far), Shalini
(Kalki, who is more confused than anything) and Joginder (Emran Hashmi, a fine
actor) are caught up in their own agendas; trying to find something to anchor
themselves in the turbulent political climes of Bharatnagar. Yet, I would not
call any of them protagonists; they're characters, each organically placed in
their roles, which makes the film's progression more eased and natural without
being caught up to explain their agendas. However what really contributes to
the organic nature of the film is the fact that the supporting cast does a
brilliant job; from the wily mandarin Kaul, to the Chief Minister and her
coalition partner - his cronies, the cops, the unwitting murderers, and the
plethora of angry political hooligans....it's a myriad picture, both violent
and vibrant, and certainly something from which you cannot turn away.

Cinematically, for me,
the winning factor was the cinematography by Nikos Andritsakis. And frankly,
for someone who managed to execute a movie like Love, Sex aur Dhoka,
I would've expected nothing short of brilliance from Banerjee. There was a
constant nervousness in the camera movements, a sense of unpredictability as it
captured both the loud morcha scenes, and the quiet, narrow, yet palpable
curfewed streets of Bharatnagar. I spoke of contradictions earlier, and it's
notable that the cinematography contributes to the visual telling of these
contradictions; the government offices, with glass doors, polished conference
tables, and the municipal schools, non-functional toilets.

The score, I felt was
apt for a movie as intense as Shanghai, and it is what really
contributed to the intensity of the film. The most striking feature, however,
was Banerjee's use of silence to fill in the gaps - which I believe is the
first of its kind I've ever come across in Hindi cinema. My only complaint was
Vishal-Shekhar's music which, despite sounding great in the promos on TV, did
not have room in the film, and thus, resulted in a slightly jarring effect; the
songs consumed more time than what was required.

Coming back to
metaphors, I think Shanghai does more than just talk about the
Indian state's aspiration to compete with the world by converting its cities
into Shanghais. It is a commentary on the inherent contradictions within the
Indian state; contradictions between the welfare role of the state and its
capitalistic nature. It is about more than just corruption in the system and
the abuse of state power; the corruption runs far deeper, and into the Indian
psyches itself. It is a commentary on very nature of Indian politics.
Elsewhere, I've mentioned that political parties today are no longer connected
to an ideology - be it the right-wing BJP, or the so-called liberal Congress or
the Left, or any of India's regional parties - the politics of India in the
21st century is that of anti-ideology; about synthesizing a form by positioning
itself against an ideology; increased westernization, neo-liberal policy, and
so forth.

What makes Shanghai the
film it is, is the fact that Banerjee manages to capture these fine nuances on
screen, in its profoundness and yes, you guessed it, contradictions. For some
reason, I think of Shanghai as a "muted" (or, as
friend of mine put it aptly: understated) film, mostly because of its noted and
brilliant use of silence, as I said before, and also because you feel a sense
of futility, of being inured to its portrayal of corruption and state sponsored
violence. The Delhi HC was right it calling it a accurate description of the
state of affairs in India; look the Jaitapur, or Raigad - districts earmarked
to become the sites where India would usher in modernity and seal its place in
the global economic order.

Shanghai is
a warning bell for some alarmists, a time where the Indian state would sell the
very people who elect governments to raze areas like Bharatnagar and make them
into technological and information hubs, clean buildings, planned streets, and
most of all, a populace which is the product of India’s neo-liberal values, who
are at best passive consumers and at worse, a stupefied, silenced people. It is
also something that would intrigue cynics, because it holds no bars in giving
an honest account of the country—that we cannot do without corruption, that we
cannot build a township, a sea-link, a sky-walk without our governments and
bureaucrats having mud (and often, blood) on their hands. It talks about a
genesis, of a violent kind, when our cities become the hallmarks of the modern
global world order, in a crass Nehruvian manner of speaking.

This is the India of
the 21st century; an amalgamation of contradictions. God, I
love this country. And, it seems, the makers of Shanghai do so
too. Shanghai is a rare gem of a movie. Many won't like it,
because it raises uncomfortable questions. Many like to see the glass as half
full. But optimism doesn’t change the fact that the water in it is dirty.